Burning Grapevines
by ibuberu
Summary: Red has an easier time thinking about Leaf when she isn't around. But things don't always remain the same, and home is now harder to define and frame. — RedLeaf.


**notes – **written for a friend, but I hope the rest of you will be able to enjoy it too; also I need to thank _inked kisses_ for the beta!

* * *

**Burning Grapevines**

Red surrounded himself with the pale canvas of snow for such a long, long time. In between, he discovered how much easier it was to paint his memories in the mountain's solitude.

His fingers sunk into the cushion of white before him, his eyes fixated on the fire he'd thrown together for the night. The flames illuminated the humble little cave that served him well despite the temper of the elements – it was almost natural for him to feel at home in such a simple, silent place.

But 'feeling' and 'being' were two entirely different worlds – Red understood that much.

Home made him think of his mother's dazed sighs and the aroma of stew and rice. It made him think of stumpy fences and a big pristine lab, the smell of unkempt grass and the open sky dyed a healthy blue. Most of all, home made him linger on confident green eyes and the tenacity of a short red skirt. He'd never seen Green without his arrogance ready in hand, neither had he gotten even a glimpse of whatever was under that skirt – Green and he had placed a heated bet since they were eleven, twelve perhaps.

One of them had decreed that she wore shorts, face a bright shade of rose – the other, not so much.

The recollection led him to the gentle trace of her legs, the tipsy curve to which she angled her hat, a pair of caring eyes, the habitual sound of a girl cheering fiercely for him (distinguishable even through the roar of the spectators, owing to trained ears).

He looked up at the bare ceiling of the cave, surveyed the accommodating breadth of the floor and the spirit of the fire – and decided that it would do for now. (Perhaps even for the next few years.) But when Red thought about Pallet Town, a boy named Green and a girl called Leaf, he realized that he didn't want to stay on the mountaintop forever.

Pikachu made it much easier for him. He curled into Red's hand and squeaked on and on in a language the boy could almost understand.

* * *

"Hello!"

Red awoke from his nap to the sound of someone slipping through the opening of the cave and dusting snow off her shoulders. He blinked, adjusting his bleary eyes to the familiar sight of blue legwarmers. However, that signature skirt had taken to hiding, probably underneath the huge coat she wore.

Red was honestly struck at that moment, because really now – when was the last time he'd even seen her? After he won the title, she'd hugged her two friends with ample zest, before bolting off to some other region. (The tabloids claimed that she was jealous of how far her boys had come, and how she'd wanted to run away from the mounting expectations. But Red knew better than to believe in empty ink words.)

He managed a small wave in her general direction, his face stoic from habit and unable to relay his mild surprise. He scrutinized her form, briefly entertaining the notion that she was a hallucination.

Leaf solved that by striding forward and curling her fingers around his static waving hand. Her cotton gloves were a warm respite, and he could count the teeth decorating her smile – the rare sensation of relief, happiness, leaked out of his heart. The girl detected his affirmation, and she proceeded to slump herself next to him, scooting up just a little to get acquainted with the fire.

"Sorry I've been gone for so long, I was off training at Johto – you know, I had to get so much stronger just to keep up with the two of you," the girl laughed as she pulled off her gloves and held her hands near the flames. "I'm pretty sure I'll be able to match Green in battle soon enough," she said in accomplishment.

Red nodded, earning a smile from the girl.

"This is some place you've got here." Leaf crossed her arms as she said so, evaluating the condition of the rather empty living space.

Red moved to grab his backpack, taking out a packet of trail mix to offer to her. She accepted it, saying as ripped it open and ate handfuls of nuts, "How did you know I was hungry?" But Red didn't know, he just felt that she looked so skinny and so much smaller than the last time he saw her, food was the only way to remedy it.

"I really needed this. I've been wandering around the mountain since the afternoon. Who knew it'd take me so long to find this place?" she continued.

"Green makes it sound like there's a marked path up to this place, the way he tells me how often he comes to visit you." Leaf lowered her eyes, a hint of envy pricking the ends of her words.

Red thought he should say something to cheer her up, but he never was good with words. He gave her shoulder a light pat and took some trail mix from the pack instead.

"Thanks Red," Leaf exhaled, producing a cloud of mist in the air before her. (As the cloud faded against the pink of her cheeks, Red thought she looked like an earth fairy trapped in too harsh a winter.)

A tiny grin spread across her face as she said his name.

* * *

By the time Leaf finished filling Red in on her escapades– reciting her adventures in Hoenn and Johto, describing the battle styles and tactics of each gym leader, singing about all the astounding kinds of Pokémon they had been so naïve to – it was far into the night.

Red shook his head when Leaf said she had to leave. The air was freezing now – even for him. And the darkness would not be kind, especially with the rocky terrain mapping the area, even if she did have her arcanine with her.

He reached out to grab the sleeping bag folded at the corner of the cave and offered it to her. Leaf smiled, taking it and spreading it across both their legs as they sat upright next to one another, decency crammed tightly in the empty space between them.

"This is so much like," a soft yawn came up in the middle of her sentence, "the sleepovers we had at Green's when we were young." Red tilted his head in a questioning gesture, because the thrashing winds outside and the dip in temperature was a far cry from the cosy interior of his rival's house.

"I knew that you and Green fought over who got to sleep next to me," Leaf stifled a chuckle, and Red shifted uncomfortably at the reminder. "But I almost always slept next to you in the end." She rubbed an eye and leaned her head against the wall, before closing her eyes and letting fatigue have its way. Red watched her hair fall over her eyes, listened to the entrancing rhythm of her warm breaths, and pulled the sleeping bag further down her legs with wordless care.

* * *

He awoke to find something heavy in his lap.

In the most strategic manoeuvre of his seventeen-year old life, Red cradled her head in his hands – which he hoped weren't too cold – and inched out from underneath her. He shrugged off his vest and cap, and tucked them in the air between her head and the uneven floor. It served as an adequate pillow, for Leaf seemed unfazed and continued to slumber on.

The morning sun crept further into the cave and melted thin blankets of snow – mornings were by far the warmest time of day, and from the fact that he wasn't freezing, Red deduced that it was time to resume his place on the top of the mountain.

* * *

Pikachu had been released from his pokéball, stretching his paws and twitching his ears under the light of the day. He was as used to the cold as Red, and hardly showed difficulty as he clambered up the back of his trainer's jeans and posted himself on his shoulders.

Pikachu firm and heavy upon him – it was another wonder that meant home to him.

Suddenly, the yellow mouse leaped off his shoulders, only to have a bigger weight replace him, as Leaf draped her arms around Red. She chuckled as the boy lost his bearings and had to balance on one leg so that the two of them wouldn't tumble into the mounds of snow that clustered around the pinnacle. Leaf returned the articles of clothing to him, saying an embarrassed 'thank you' as Pikachu found his way to the top of her hat, purring and sunning himself in the most contented way.

Leaf quietened down, however, when she witnessed what lay beyond the ledge.

The land opened up at their feet, and between the curtains of clouds and fog, one could see the Kanto stitched with ranks of trees and hills, the grey buildings of Viridian rising from the earth a little ways down the winding trails that routed the mountain.

"… Beautiful," she hummed. Red watched her drink in the scenery, hair tousled from sleep and sunlight collecting under her long lashes, the weight of one hand still on his shoulders.

Yes, she was.

* * *

Leaf started to reacquaint herself to Kanto, following her old footprints and scouring the land – searching for peril or incident to satisfy her adventurous diet. Nothing much had changed in all the years she had been gone – that was what she informed Red when she dropped by and recounted her tales.

Somehow, the knowledge did not disturb him as much as it did her – Red did not take to the idea of the world changing while he remained isolated in his sanctuary of ice and rocks. He could not imagine his mother's simple garden bulldozed by a high-rise building, the Professor's lab undergoing renovated and expansion – all these minute details, they meant as much to him as they did to Leaf.

The girl did not seem to mind the uniformity of it all, though. She smiled when she sat next to him, and Red thought that maybe, Leaf would like to stay on Mount Silver with him. Every day was a new adventure, a new rock fall that would lead to an unexplored section of the highlands; sprightly pokémon evolved with the cycle of the seasons, stronger, faster, more durable than the last, and the winds here were far too diverted from habit – always changing to suit their temperament.

But Red could not tell her any of this. She wouldn't have liked living in the mountains, cooped up in an enclosed world of snow and hail.

Even he did not love it (but this feeling surfaced when she was gone, only when he couldn't see the colour of her eyes and the curve of her smile anymore).

* * *

"You have a thing for Leaf, don't you?" Green snorted, folding his arms and rubbing his hands against them in a rocking motion. Even after years, he still hadn't gotten used to the cold.

Red tapped his fingertips against the hard surface of the floor. He never really knew what was considered 'having a thing'. He supposed he did have 'something' with Green. After all they had survived as rivals (and as friends) for over a decade – Red could not deny that he held a soft spot for the gawky boy. But he didn't have the urge to hold Green's hand or touch his shoulder, or wake up with that spiky head snoring in his lap.

It was not the same – the way his emotions reacted to combat Green, as compared to Leaf. That much, Red knew.

"Let me give you a tip, Red. She probably likes you too but she won't do anything because the guy's always supposed to take the initiative, got that?" the gym leader advised in a sharp tone.

Red straightened his shoulders and offered him a barely noticeable raise of the eyebrow.

"She wants you to tell her you like her first, dumbass," Green explained.

Though Red showed no facial change, inwardly, he experienced a wave of incredulity. He had liked her since they were kids, and he was fairly sure she knew it too – why would they have spent so many afternoons lying face down in pretty gardens and toasting in the summers?

There was no need to tell people what came to them as common sense. Green was… a poor love consultant.

* * *

One day, Leaf took his wrist in her hand and led him out of the cave – it took Red a while to refocus his attention from the bracelet of fingers so warm on his skin, to the fact that they were treklking down the mountain. He tugged his hand, and Leaf glanced at him over her shoulder.

"We never get to do anything fun up there other than battling, let's go down and have a proper dinner for a change." She tightened her grip, and the boy could not bear to break the contact. His legs found a mind of their own, and dutifully kept up with Leaf's springy pace.

"You've never been on a date, right? The girls in school could never understand you," Leaf remarked as they walked along the road to Viridian City. Red almost missed her statement – he breathed in the scent of flowers and leaves, warm air breezing through his hair and the feeling of the evening teasing his skin like it was made of ice.

But he caught on soon enough, and pieced her words together in his brain. Did she mean that they were on a date at that very moment? What was the expected etiquette for such a phenomenon? Green had never bothered to mention to him – he had heard folktales about presenting girls with bouquets of flowers and showering them with chocolate when he was young, but Leaf was not an extreme fan of either.

His train of thought could not travel any further, however – as soon as they walked down the streets of Viridian, passers-by started jabbing their fingers in the air and hollering out his name. Hordes of children and pokémon alike flocked towards him and Leaf, some sailing past horning cars and scrambling over gates, rushing to talk to him. The girl beside him tensed up, and a curse word fell from her lips. He had never seen her so fearful in his life – not since they were eight, when he fell from a tree and broke his arm. It made his body freeze along with hers.

"Is that Red?"

"Red!"

"He has a girlfriend!"

Red could not discern much in the barrage of flashes that assaulted them. The only thing that came to mind was a sharp recall of why he even decided to retreat to Mount Silver in the first place.

Green was like a beacon in the crowd, elbowing his way through with ease, brandishing his badge and fist at the suffocating people. But his arrival was too late, Leaf had already been torn from Red's side. She stood alone outside of ripples of people that clung to his vest and clamoured to shake his numbing hand, eyes wide and body trembling.

* * *

"I think I'll go off again, let the media cool down and stop these nasty rumours," Leaf announced the next day in the early morning. She hadn't stayed over with him like she did usually (it had developed into a routine that Red would now miss), she'd risen at five and made her way up herself, knees bruised from the hurried ascent and face clear of doubts. Red thought she was the most breathtaking in times like these, when she squared her shoulders and ironed her skirt with her hands, trying to be strong.

"To Sinnoh this time, they'll never look for me there." She nodded her head at the decision, looking over her shoulder to see what would be Red's take on things.

"I know you and Green will tell me to stay here, at home, but I just… don't fit in here. No matter how much I want to," she whispered, rubbing her palms together and narrowing her eyes with regret. Something made Red's heart clench in his chest, it was the odd sensation of familiarity in her words that made his skin bristle and his eyes dilate.

Red had a blank look on his face, and it was different from his usual nonchalance – he wondered if Leaf could tell.

(Of course she could, she was Leaf. And she hitched the sling of her bag on one shoulder and walked out of the cave without saying anything more.)

* * *

The sound of Green's pidgeot pecking furiously against the wall of the cave shook Red from his sleep. A plastic tube was clamped in its sharp talons, and upon closer inspection, it contained a letter that had been messily rolled up.

"_You idiot!"_ was the greeting. _"Leaf is leaving today! If you won't make an exception for me, at least come down this once to see her off. She'll be sad if you don't, and I have a track record for punching anyone that makes Leaf cry."_

_"Don't you have one too? I still have the scars to prove it."_

The paper crinkled in his hands – he hadn't known. No one had told him, Green must have assumed that Leaf had informed him, but she hadn't spoken to him since she left the cave a week ago. Truthfully, there had been a part of Red that refused to believe Leaf's words that day. (But she was Leaf, and she always stuck through with her decisions, didn't she?)

Red folded the letter neatly, looking up to see that the pidgeot was still loitering in the cave, hopping from one foot to the other – was it waiting for his reply? He tried to slot the letter back into the container, but the pidgeot pulled it away from his grip, clicking its beak and demanding that a reply be written as it flapped its wings with impatience.

But Red didn't have time for that. He tucked the letter into the back pocket of his worn jeans, and bolted out of the cave, unclipping his charizard's pokéball from his belt.

* * *

He met someone near the base of Mount Silver, scaling a gentle slope of rocky indents. She had blue leggings covering delicate legs, a white hat positioned just so – and a skirt hiked up to a precarious, taunting height. When charizard landed behind her and Red dismounted, she turned, hair falling to frame her kind eyes.

She didn't call out to him or run towards him, she fixed herself to a standstill – as did he. And then, there was a cloud of silence. Red found it oddly uncomfortable.

Leaf had taken off her hat, and her hands clawed at the material. She seemed to be struggling with what to say – something Red could not understand, for he had never actually experienced such a predicament. So, he waited for her to find her words.

"Y-you didn't come to say good bye!" Leaf frowned.

Red paused. Then, he walked up to her, taking her hand into one of his.

It was warm – his hands must have been so cold, but he couldn't let go of her touch. Not this time.

"Neither did you."

Leaf trembled, a tear rolled down her cheek before she threw her hands around him – and the feeling of a girl curled against him made him feel so human, made him suddenly aware of how many weaknesses he had and what an idle lifestyle he tolerated. She reminded him that he had a heart, and it pounded in tandem with hers.

Most of all – he felt like he was home.

* * *

**epilogue**

In the end, Leaf continued travelling – it was an earnest calling for her. But she always made sure to visit often enough, and mail letters to Red and a sullen Green. They had a peaceful relationship, keeping a cautious range from the media's radar.

And along the way, Red found out who was the winner of the bet.

(Well, it was common knowledge amongst the three of them that he was always the victor, even when it came to instances outside of battling. Green really had to start getting used to it by now.)


End file.
